The American Sitcom Marriage

One of my biggest pet peeves has been – and probably always will be – how the media (by which I mainly mean movies and TV) portrays marriage: the couple is head-over-heels in love at the wedding and during the honeymoon, then fast forward five to ten years and you’re left with an image of the the stereotypical ball-and-chain. The nagging wife. The husband who comes home from work and sits on the couch drinking beer and watching TV. Husband and wife rarely speaking to one another except to complain about what the other person is doing wrong. Sex is viewed as an obligation. They are nothing more than glorified roommates – and sometimes I wouldn’t even include the word “glorified.”

This seriously bothers me because this is what people think marriage is supposed to look like, and it’s not! Don’t get me wrong, the “honeymoon phase” ends and I don’t think we should present marriage as being perfect, either, because it’s not. People shouldn’t go into marriage expecting it to be wonderful all the time. There are tears. There are disagreements. There are rough patches. Love languages change. Marriage is hard, but rewarding. Trying, but humbling. Messy, but beautiful. But marriage is worth fighting for.

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What breaks my heart the most, though, is when real people are making the “ball-and-chain” comments when they learn that I am married. Instead of saying, “What a beautiful journey you’re beginning. It’s going to be hard, but it’s going to be so worth it” they say, “Just wait a few years. See how you feel then.” This really upsets me. One, because they are so incorrectly portraying what marriage is supposed to look like, and two, because it means that they aren’t experiencing marriage the way it should be experienced.

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I’m not okay with settling for the American Sitcom Marriage. I want the rich, deep marriage that God intended. I wasn’t okay with it long before I even met my husband. I don’t want young people to watch TV and think that marriage is going to be awful and boring (it certainly isn’t!). I don’t want those who are already married to be okay with less than God’s best. This is why I’m writing a series on marriage, the first post of which you just read!

Next week, I’m going to talk about while marriage is designed to be amazing, marriage is not all that there is.

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As always, get in touch! You can email me at wordssweeterthanhoneyblog@gmail.com, on Twitter (@BrandiVermette), or on Instagram (@brandigrace96)!